I Will Let You Down
by Feilyn
Summary: In the end, some people never change. Sasuke is an avenger. An Avenger. He’s not entirely sure who he’s Avenging anymore, but that’s not the point. The point is... The point is that he’s Avenging something. At least, he’s pretty sure he is. NaruSasu


In the end, some people never change.

There is a point you reach in your life, commonly referred to as the point of no return. The point where you have gone so far into something that there is no purpose in doing a heel face turn. The point where there is no longer any reason for you to be doing what you're doing, except for the fact that you are doing it.

Sasuke is an avenger. An Avenger. He's not entirely sure who he's Avenging anymore, but that's not the point. The point is...

The point is that he's Avenging _something_. At least, he's pretty sure he is.

Propped up on one elbow, Sasuke watches Naruto sleep, twisted into some bizarre shape more appropriate to the idiot's favourite food than any human being. He snuffles something unintelligible, and Sasuke resists the urge to roll his eyes as Naruto simultaneously manages to contort further and take up even more of the bed space.

"You're an idiot," he says to the sleeping form out loud. One, because it makes him feel better and two, because it's true. Only an idiot believes a double-crosser.

Sasuke shifts silently into a sitting position, the bed sheets not even _thinking_ about rustling as he moves. Dark eyes trace the contours of Naruto's body, lingering over the shadows of his face in the dim light before sweeping down his neck to pick out the scars on his bare chest. Sasuke knows, intimately, exactly which ones he caused.

Preoccupied as he is in wondering where that one mark over the blond's hip comes from, it takes him a moment to realise blue eyes are blinking blearily back at him.

Naruto's face screws up unhappily. "Shut up," he moans.

There's a brief pause as Sasuke actually looks around the room to see if there's anyone else in there that the idiot could be talking to. Confirming that there are actually only two of them in the room, he simply quirks an eyebrow.

And receives a pillow to the face for his trouble. "I can hear you thinking from over here," Naruto grumbles. "'S fuckin' annoying."

"Dobe," Sasuke says in response, because what the hell else was he meant to say?

All he gets in return is a limp arm flopping heavily onto his stomach in a sad mockery of a punch. "Gimme back my pillow," he yawns.

Everything about this idiot logically says that Sasuke has nothing to lose by leaving him behind again. But Sasuke's new to this logic thing, so maybe that's why the recurring idea of abandoning this whole Avenging thing stalks through his dreams to the point where he thinks that if he falls asleep, he might actually wake up happy and well adjusted with nothing to Avenge.

It's a scary thought.

Sasuke slides back down again, carefully presenting his back to Naruto as he curls his body around the pillow. "You should have thought about that before you threw it at me." A pause. "Usuratonkachi." Because it's not a proper conversation with Naruto if he hasn't called him a moron at least once.

The idiot is too tired to even flail half-heartedly about being called names, and Sasuke is forced to clamp down hard on a sharp spike of worry. He's past that. He has to move _past_ that, because he's run out of time to spend in this Village, and he's already in overdraft when it comes to Naruto.

Sasuke is _synonymous_ with Avenger. It is who he is, his soul, the core of his being. It's not a set of well-working internal organs that keeps him going, but rather this idea that one day he will have Avenged his family or Avenged Itachi or Avenged his freaking _life_ that hasn't been a life since he was six years old and missing targets at the Academy.

Take the Avenger away from Sasuke, and there's nothing left. Not even the antonym that is Uzumaki Naruto can give him meaning again.

He has all of three seconds warning before hot breath ghosts across his shoulders as the idiot buries his face in the back of his neck, an arm draping over his torso and clenching in the pillow. Sasuke tenses slightly in preparation for Naruto's rescue attempt, but a faint snuffling against his skin followed by the deeper sound of snoring announces that the blond has simply collapsed into sleep again, chest pressed flush to Sasuke's back like a limpet clinging to a rock.

The Avenger sighs and lies down again, body automatically sinking into the easiest position to avoid being hit when the idiot starts tossing and turning again.

_I will let you down._

But not yet.

If nothing else, this time Naruto deserves to be betrayed in daylight


End file.
